The Supreme Council for Motherhood & Childhood organized the Fatima Bint Mubarak Forum for Motherhood & Childhood in November 2016, which focused on creativity in early childhood development. The forum contributed to reviewing and discussing innovative practices in development in the early stages of a child's life and on the role of parents, schools and professionals in enriching children's growth and developing their experiences, perceptions, skills, and mental abilities as well as their interests and perceptions.
About 600 people attended the forum, from federal and local government agencies, kings, heads of state, policy makers, specialists, civil society institutions, United Nations agencies, motherhood and childhood councils from Arab countries, academics, researchers and university students.
• To identify options for parents and professionals to build the necessary conditions for developing children’s critical thinking, innovation and creativity.
• To share best practices and information on innovative theories and solutions for early childhood development.
• To discuss and position innovation in education on the local, regional and international agenda.
• To encourage entrepreneurial investment in new ideas in early childhood development.
• To offer guidance for parents to cultivate further skills and talents in their children.
• To promote the participation of children in public dialogues and on topics of interest to them.
• To recognize the enormous efforts of UAE political leaders in developing the education sector from foundation of the federation to date.
• To announce Fatima bint Mubarak Motherhood and Childhood Award.
A group of 25 children from the UAE discussing the role of families, schools and society in spurring their innovation and creativity.
The integral role of the UAE’s political leadership in creating a paradigm shift in the quality of education since 1971 to this day.
The important role of parents, caregivers, educators and State policies in laying a solid foundation of for children’s personality development and in enriching their experience, perspectives, skills, mental abilities and interests.
A look into some global emerging innovation solutions to foster great caregiving and teaching and inclusion of young children with special needs into ECD programmes.
• more volunteering opportunities should be available for children as this would improve their social skills, perspectives, values and morals..
• Child and youth centres should be adopted as a federal initiative and mainstreamed in all Emirates so that all children have equal opportunities to participate in these centres
• There should be a greater focus on extracurricular activities in schools.
• Children with disabilities should be fully included in educational and public environments and provided with equal opportunities as their normally-developed counterparts.
• There should be opportunities for female adolescents to participate in various physical activities; Ministry of Education and Abu Dhabi Education Council should consider adopting international experiences that provide less instruction hours and less homework along with increased playing and participation time.
There were two parts of the FBMMCF exhibition,
A place for some of the children taking place in the first panel of the forum to display their inventions. For example, Fatima Al Kaabi an Emirati inventor highlighted two of her inventions, a robot that welcomes people and a car steering wheel that has sensors.
As well as Saeed Al Rumaithi, a self-taught young man who spends his free time traveling from one location to another in order to find all the pieces he needs for his inventions. He put together a machine that will help in the process of farming; his thought behind it is to find ways for the UAE to be number one without using oil.
The second part was for companies and establishments whose work relates to the needs of motherhood and childhood. As follows:
• UNICEF
• George Washington University
• Al Jalila Cultural Center for Children
• Mohammed bin Khalid Al Nahyan Future Generation Society
• Lamsa
• Sajaya
• The Developing Child Center
• Alpha Apps
• Iftah ya Simsim